Tenders Are Invited For Consultancy Services To Conduct Baseline Assessment For E-Access Project

Tenders are invited for Consultancy Services to Conduct Baseline Assessment for E-ACCESS Project Closing Date: 24 Jul 2026 Type: Consultancy Project: Project E-ACCESS (Expanding Contraceptive Access in Communities: Empowering Support & Services) Assignment Type: Consultancy (Individual Consultant or Research Firm) Duty Station / Fieldwork Sites: Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja: Dutse and Byazhin Indicative Duration: 4 weeks (inclusive of inception, fieldwork, analysis, and reporting) Reports To: Technical Director, Pathfinder International Nigeria Background Nigeria carries a significant share of the global burden of maternal mortality and unmet need for family planning. National data show a modern contraceptive prevalence rate (mCPR) of just 15%, a contraceptive discontinuation rate of 41% among users, and an unmet need for contraception among married women aged 1549 that has risen to 21%. Nationally, close to a quarter of women report having experienced an unintended pregnancy at some point in their lives, with adolescents and young people facing disproportionate social, educational, and economic consequences, including school dropout and heightened maternal health risks. Within the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), a relatively high concentration of health facilities has not translated into equitable access to family planning for adolescents and young people. Provider bias, confidentiality concerns, fear of judgment, restrictive social norms, weak communityfacility referral linkages, and limited availability of youth-friendly services continue to constrain uptake, particularly among unmarried adolescents and young women in urban slums and peri-urban settlements. Pathfinder International, Nigeria, with support from Organons Her Health Grants Program, is implementing Project E-ACCESS, a 12-month initiative designed to expand access to a full range of modern contraceptive methods for young people aged 1535 in underserved FCT communities. The project is built around three complementary strategies: Health System Strengthening, Last-Mile Service Integration, and Community-Led Demand Generation. It will be implemented in partnership with the FCT Primary Health Care Board (PHCB), traditional and religious leaders, area council structures, and local health committees. To inform the project implementation roadmap, a baseline assessment is required. This assessment will combine a structured health facility assessment with a qualitative community perception study, and its findings will directly inform the selection of target communities and facilities, the content of provider capacity-building and demand-generation activities, and the benchmarks against which project performance will be measured at endline. Rationale for the Assessment A robust baseline is essential to ground Project E-ACCESS in local evidence rather than assumptions. Specifically, the assessment will: Determine the actual readiness of supported health facilities to deliver youth-responsive family planning services, including commodity availability, staffing, and provider capacity; Surface community-level knowledge gaps, misconceptions, and social norms that shape contraceptive decision-making among adolescents and young people, to sharpen the design of IEC materials and demand-generation activities; Identify gaps in equipment, training, commodity availability, support services, and resources needed by facilities and providers to offer high-quality family planning counseling and services. Understand clients perceptions of family planning services provided at high-volume sites and client satisfaction with quality of service provided. Purpose and Objectives 1. General Objective To generate credible, disaggregated baseline evidence on the readiness of selected health facilities to deliver quality, youth-responsive family planning services, and community knowledge, attitudes, perceptions, and social norms regarding modern contraception among adolescents and young people aged 1535 in target FCT communities. The findings will inform the design of Project E-ACCESS and serve as a benchmark for the endline evaluation. 2. Specific Objectives Assess the availability, functionality, and readiness of family planning and Adolescent and Youth Sexual and Reproductive Health (AYSRH) services at selected health facilities, including infrastructure, staffing levels, method mix, commodity stock status, pricing, and referral linkages. Assess health service providers training history, method-specific knowledge, service-provision practices, and attitudes, including indicators of provider bias such as informal age, marital status, or partner consent requirements, with particular attention to the treatment of adolescent and unmarried clients. Explore community knowledge, attitudes, misconceptions, and socio-cultural norms around modern contraceptive methods among adolescents and young people (1535). Identify individual, interpersonal, community, and health-system barriers and facilitators to contraceptive access, uptake, and continuation among the target population. Examine the role and influence of gatekeepers, including parents/caregivers, male partners, traditional rulers, and religious leaders, on young peoples reproductive health decision-making and access to services. 3. Scope of Work The assessment comprises two complementary and mutually reinforcing components, to be conducted concurrently within the same target communities to allow for triangulation of findings. 4.1 Component 1: Health Facility Assessment (Quantitative) This component will assess the supply-side readiness of primary health care facilities in target Area Councils to deliver family planning and AYSRH services. It comprises: Health Facility Audit: covering facility type and managing authority, operating days/hours, staffing complement, contraceptive method mix and stock status (including stock-outs in the preceding 3 and 12 months), commodity pricing, equipment and supplies, supportive supervision history, and youth-friendly service features. Service Provider Assessment: covering provider cadre, pre-service and in-service training history (including specific FP/AYSRH topics and VCAT/provider-bias training), method-specific knowledge and provision practice, and any informal eligibility criteria applied in practice (e.g., minimum age, marital status, parity, or partner-consent requirements) that may constitute provider bias against young or unmarried clients. Client Exit Assessment (where feasible): brief structured exit interviews with consenting clients, including young clients, to capture counseling quality, privacy, waiting time, and satisfaction, complementing the facility-level and provider-level data. 4.2 Component 2: Qualitative Community Perception Assessment This component will generate an in-depth understanding of how adolescents and young people, and the gatekeepers who influence them, perceive and engage with modern contraception. Target respondent categories include: Adolescents and young people aged 1535, disaggregated into age bands (1519, 2024, 2535), by sex, and by marital status; Parents and caregivers of adolescents; Male partners/spouses; Traditional rulers, religious leaders, and other community gatekeepers; Community Health Extension Workers (CHEWs) and prospective community "Health Champions"; Health facility providers, for triangulation with Component 1 findings. Suggested data collection methods include Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) segmented by sex, age band, and marital status; Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) with gatekeepers, providers, and relevant PHCB/HHSS officials; and, where appropriate, In-Depth Interviews (IDIs) with young current and non-users of contraception. The final mix and number of sessions will be proposed by the consultant and agreed with Pathfinder. Indicative thematic areas include knowledge of and misconceptions about modern methods; perceived social acceptability and stigma; confidentiality and privacy concerns; experiences of or fears about provider bias; decision-making autonomy and negotiation with partners; the role of male engagement; religious and cultural influences on contraceptive use; preferred sources of information and trusted messengers; and community suggestions for making services more youth friendly. The consultant will develop semi-structured FGD and KII guides (in English and relevant local languages, including Hausa) aligned to these themes, for Pathfinders review and approval prior to fieldwork Proposed Methodology 5.1: Overall Approach The assessment will use a concurrent mixed-methods design, combining structured quantitative data collection (facility- and provider-level) with qualitative inquiry (community-level), conducted within the same target communities to enable triangulation and a coherent set of findings and recommendations. 5.2: Geographic Scope and Sampling Target Area Councils and communities will be identified through stakeholder mapping and desk review, in consultation with the FCT PHCB, with priority given to underserved peri-urban and urban-slum settlements. Within this frame, the consultant will propose and justify a sampling strategy for Pathfinders review and approval, covering: The number and selection criteria for health facilities to be audited and where provider interviews and client exit interviews will be conducted; The number, composition, and disaggregation of FGDs and KIIs required to reach thematic saturation across sex, age band, and marital status; A justified minimum sample size for each data collection tool, with an explicit non-response/attrition allowance. 5.3: Data Collection Methods and Tools Quantitative tools will be administered via an electronic data collection platform (e.g., ODK, KoBoCollect, or equivalent) to enable real-time data quality checks. Qualitative sessions will Tender Link : https://reliefweb.int/job/4222078/consultancy-services-conduct-baseline-assessment-e-access-project